The timetable for WiMAX CERTIFIED gear has morphed a bit early on, as chip vendors and radio manufacturers adjusted to the requirements of essentially building a new cohesive industry from scratch. There has been some criticism of the timeline for actual commercial WiMAX launches to begin. However, it is important to understand that the broadband wireless access industry has possessed no true outdoor MAN level standard of any kind in the past. The industry’s customer demand notwithstanding this liability has been very limiting.

Essentially, regardless of when WiMAX CERTIFIED gear becomes available is in many ways a moot point. There are no other standard options extant that could meet future BWA industry needs. The BWA industry needs WiMAX as soon as it becomes available whether that is near term or far term. Happily however, interoperability testing reached its full swing in the first half of 2006. In fact, four companies including SEQUANS, Wavesat, Aperto and Redline achieved certification on the air interface phase of WiMAX testing in the very first phase. The second phase which included testing for QOS and other optional capabilities is already well underway with more than 25 plus companies scheduled to be tested. In fact, this number of vendors required the CETECOM/AT4Wireless labs to set up additional test bed sites.

It should be noted however on the Fixed WiMAX side, that if a proprietary broadband fixed wireless technology were to gain sufficient traction, it could become a de-facto standard for that market segment. As it appears, the Forum is moving strongly to mobility systems the product lines available for fixed broadband wireless possible could not achieve the economies of scale that some proprietary solutions already are achieving.